‘Not a cult at all’: The Daily Show’s Jordan Klepper heads to Iowa Trump rally so you don’t have to

More patriotic than you.

Walter Einenkel

Daily Kos Staff

Tuesday October 19, 2021 · 11:19 AM MDT

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The Daily Show’s Jordan Klepper has made a comedy name for himself for his field pieces, where he interacts with the illogical circus that is MAGA Americana. As far as comedy field pieces go, the MAGA crowd has always been like shooting fish in a barrel as there are so many lost, confused, and outright ridiculous folks to interview at any MAGA or MAGA-related event. Even before The Donald successfully conned his way into an electoral college victory in November 2016, the MAGA crowd was ripe for The Daily Show’s send ups. After Trump lost soundly to President Joe Biden, The Daily Show has continued to follow the various iterations of MAGA rallies and anti-mask rallies—which are pretty much the same thing.

On Monday, Klepper went to Des Moines, Iowa, to talk with MAGA types at a “Trump won” rally being held in October 2021, which is approaching a year since Donald Trump lost his bid at reelection. Klepper opened the piece by mentioning that this was his first Trump rally since The Donald lost his bid at a dictatorship on Jan. 6, 2021, “a day no one will ever forget … unless you're a Republican member of Congress.” Humor can be cathartic, especially in the face of such willful ignorance.

After talking to the ludicrously dressed man in the photo at the top of this story, Klepper speaks with a couple, mentioning that he hasn’t been at a rally since Jan. 6. He begins with a little gallows humor dad joke: “Have you seen any gallows go up anywhere?” The couple laughs and says no, they haven’t. “Do you think Mike Pence will show up here today or does he not want to hang?” 

The couple says he would be afraid because “he was a coward, he didn’t do the right thing.” Klepper reminds them that it might have more to do with the gallows thing, and the idea that a MAGA rally might end with the former vice president dying. Klepper then gives a little tour of some of the signage, including “a Confederate flag, in Iowa,” and “images of Trump on a velociraptor with a machine gun.”

The Klepper talks to two ladies—both wearing single shoulder-attached America flag overalls—who bristle at the portrayal of MAGA rally participants as “some kind of a cult.” He asks them if they are looking forward to the disgraced former president saying anything in particular:

Not a cult

WOMAN #1: Oh gosh, I feel like whatever he spews out of his mouth, I just love it.

WOMAN #2: I just love—

JORDAN KLEPPER: It doesn't matter what he says?

WOMAN #1: Yeah.

WOMAN #2: We're gonna love it, we're gonna love being here. We're going to love hearing what he has to say.

KLEPPER: But this isn't a cult?

WOMAN #1: No, I don't think so.

Images of someone selling “Womens [sic] Pee Funnel” for $15 fill the screen while Klepper says in voice over: “Not a cult at all. It's not like they would rather almost piss themselves than miss a second of the Donald's speech.”

Immigration in Iowa big issue for these guys

But this is a rally for Donald Trump, and if they believe Donald Trump is still actually the president, it doesn’t also mean they can’t hope he will still run for … the job he supposedly still has … in 2024. Speaking with two younger men, both wearing sunglasses on an overcast day and holding out a banner that reads “TRUMP -2024- TAKE AMERICA BACK,” Klepper asks them what the big issues are that they hope Trump will address. They answer: “The border crisis,” which these two fellas believe has been “brushed under the rug.” Klepper asks if these two patriots are from Iowa. They are indeed! “So you're worried about people coming from Minnesota?”

Exactly.

They have feelings too. But f!@# your feelings!

Then we move on to all of the “Fuck your feelings” MAGA types who think the left is so uncivil, and who feel like they are being disrespected for sharing their views. Two ladies dressed in matching bizarre outfits lament how some people have stopped talking to them completely “for my views.” Klepper understands, saying: “They should show respect.” This is exactly the point, the women agree. Then Klepper points out that the two ladies are wearing T-shirts with images of Donald Trump holding up two middle fingers, with writing that says, “One for Biden, One for Harris.”

WOMAN: I think they speak for themselves.

KLEPPER: Why wouldn’t someone want to engage with that, am I right?

It is here that we walk into the world of QAnon. You can’t have a MAGA rally without a heavy Q presence. It’s the whole conspiracy: the ever-changing conspiracy. The cognitive dissonance and the break from this temporal plane of existence that must be employed to be a follower of “Q” is extraordinary. Speaking with one man who believes Donald Trump is still the acting president of the United States, Klepper attempts to pierce this delusion, specifically when the man asserts that Donald Trump is “flying around the world on Air Force One.” Klepper asks about how President Joe Biden can be on Air Force One if Trump is. The man says Biden is not, and that the entire Biden presidency is fake.

In fact, Trump is not only running the country, he is “Running the military.”

He’s got it all figured out

KLEPPER: And he’s running the military? So we should blame him for what happened in Afghanistan?

MAN: No.

KLEPPER: But it’s still his fault.

MAN: It’s way beyond my—

KLEPPER: —understanding.

And finally, guess what? The Jan. 6 insurrection at our country’s Capitol building was a job done by the FBI … and antifa … “Basically RINOs” … the deep state.

And the CIA.

Enjoy-ish.